Lonnie D. Pearson

A November drug arrest on Interstate 255 in Columbia has resulted in new charges related to child porn for a Missouri man.

Lonnie Dean Pearson, 52, of Kirkwood, Mo., was taken into custody last week on a Monroe County arrest warrant for five felony counts of possessing child pornography. He posted bond on Tuesday and was released from the Monroe County Jail in Waterloo.

Pearson was initially arrested Nov. 7 on a St. Louis County probation violation in addition to charges of possession of a controlled substance (cocaine) and possession of drug paraphernalia.

During the I-255 traffic stop, police said Pearson consented to searches of his vehicle and all contents in his possession, including a cell phone. His phone was turned over to the Metropolitan Enforcement Group of Southwestern Illinois, a multi-jurisdictional drug task force. At that time, MEGSI found disturbing images on Pearson’s phone and decided to involve the FBI’s Cyber Crimes Task Force. A detailed analysis of the phone by task force investigators determined that Pearson’s phone contained sexually explicit images of adults into which the faces of children were digitally inserted onto the bodies, police said.

An arrest warrant was subsequently issued on the child porn charges.